Iona reviews the papers with Vanessa

Review your mortgage, Iona advised on BBC Radio London this morning as Vanessa Feltz’s guest discussing the morning papers.

If rates do go up next week, it will only be to their pre-Brexit level of 0.5% so mortgage rates won’t be going through the roof, Iona said. “But Mark Carney has said we are going to see rates going up which means we should be starting to prepare for that. If you haven’t already looked at your mortgage deal you might decide now is the time to switch.”

Iona said many people were on tracker mortgages to take advantage of ultra-low rates, and while fixed rate deals were already becoming more expensive there were still some good deals out there. It was surprising how much people could save in switching their loan, she said.

Vanessa asked how easy that was, given the problems people reported in switching their utility company. Iona said lending was now much stricter, especially for the self-employed, and anyone who was newly self-employed might find their borrowing criteria a lot tighter.

Iona also discussed the proposal for lower university entrance requirements for those from disadvantaged homes, saying she was strongly opposed to it as creating problems for those students when they came to university. She preferred the idea of supporting such students in a foundation course.

Her choice of stories also included the possible farming out of social care to ‘spare rooms’ in people’s houses, the suspension of a Labour shadow cabinet member, and the latest political briefings on Brexit.